


Not Today

by thejadedidealist



Category: Heathers (1988), Heathers: The Musical - Murphy & O'Keefe
Genre: Angst, Canon Divergence, F/M, Fluff, JD gets some fucking help, ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 10:19:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18892651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thejadedidealist/pseuds/thejadedidealist
Summary: “One of us has to die, Veronica. Let’s face it, I deserve it.”“Fuck that!”Veronica is not about to let JD martyr himself. Not while he can still be saved.





	Not Today

         “Stop.”

         The voice was ragged, edged with pain and desperation, but there was no mistaking its owner.

         Jason Dean.

         Veronica froze and turned, and suddenly found herself face to face with a very injured, very angry JD. His hands were stained dark red where they clutched the wound in his stomach.       The wound she had made. When she’d _shot_ him. Veronica almost couldn't believe her eyes. She had watched him _die._ She had stood there, leaning over him, begging him to tell her how to disarm the bomb as he remained silent, the life draining from his eyes until he finally had gone limp. He'd seemed so  _dead_. And yet somehow, he had managed to catch up to her. Her ankle must have been slowing her down more than she realized.

         She felt her body start to shake—out of fear, guilt, rage, relief, she wasn’t sure. JD’s face was a contorted mask as he lurched after her, outstretching an arm. Panicked, she whirled back around, limping forward as fast as her screaming ankle would let her, praying the bomb was far enough away from the school. She wouldn’t make it much farther, as injured as she was, and she didn’t want to think about what might happen if JD caught her. She didn’t have to wonder for long, because before she’d taken two more hobbling steps, a heavy hand came down on her shoulder.

         She was unsteady enough as it was, with her most likely broken ankle and half-dislocated shoulder from wielding the croquet mallet, and when he grabbed her it was enough to knock her off balance. She tumbled to the ground, and she felt JD come down on top of her.

         It was all she could do to lay there, fighting to recover the breath that had been knocked out of her and to see through the stars of pain that exploded across her vision. JD rolled off of her with a wheezing grunt. Before she could pick herself up, he was on his feet, scooping the bomb up from where it had fallen from her grasp a few feet away. Still clutching his gut with one hand, he kept going toward the center of the football field. That surprised her. She would have thought for certain he would make toward the school.

         “What are you doing?” she croaked, rolling onto her hands and knees.

         “What does it look like I’m doing?” he spat over his shoulder. “Get back.”

         Without thinking, Veronica stood up and lunged for him, nearly falling to the ground when her ankle gave out beneath her. JD caught her with one bloodstained hand. God, he was losing a lot of blood.

         “I’m not letting you kill yourself,” she rasped, tugging at his trench coat. “That’s what started this whole mess, and it’s not going to fix it.”

         JD pushed her away. “One of us has to die, Veronica. Let’s face it, I deserve it.”

         “Fuck that!” she exclaimed, lunging toward him and grabbing the bomb out from under his arm. With all her strength, she chucked it into the center of the field. It went a fair distance—she said a silent thank you to her mother for making her join the middle school softball team—but they were still far too close.

         JD stared at her, face awash with fury, awe, confusion. She didn’t let him linger that way for long.

         “Come on,” she prompted, dragging him as quickly as she could out of the open. It was slow going. They were both hardly standing, leaning heavily on one another as they made their way off the field.

         “You’re crazy,” JD muttered between ragged breaths.

         “That’s rich.”

         He let out one of his roguish, ironic chuckles, and her chest tightened. The bomb would be going off any moment now, and this could be the last time she ever heard that laugh. 

         “Little further,” she grunted, dragging herself along, sight set on the low, concrete building that housed the locker rooms.

         “It won’t be far enough,” JD warned.

         Veronica glared at him. “Then I wouldn’t have made it anyway, so there’s no point in sacrificing yourself, you fucking martyr. Shut up and keep moving.”

         Her ankle screamed with every step, and she could hear JD’s breathing become more and more labored. She thought she could feel the warmth of his blood seeping into her clothes where they leaned against each other. _He gave me no choice,_ she reminded herself. _It was him or everyone else._ But now everyone else was safe, and all her focus was on getting them behind that building, sheltered from the blast that would surely come any minute—any second.

         JD let out a rattling cough, and Veronica saw a spray of blood at the edge of her vision. His steps were beginning to falter.

         “Just a little further,” she urged, not looking at him for fear of what she might see. He was fading fast; she could feel it. How much blood had he already lost? Those dark eyes, so full of life—and lately, death—would they be empty if she looked now?

         Veronica couldn’t believe it when they managed to get to the outbuilding. She was practically dragging JD at that point, no easy feat considering her own state.

         “Almost there, JD. We’re almost safe, look.”

         JD put a hand out to the side of the building, steadying himself.

         “Veronica...” he murmured. The next step, he was down. His body crumpled out from under her grasp, and he hit the ground like dead weight, letting out a wheeze as the air was knocked from his lungs.

         “JD?” She knelt over him, a sick dread rising in her throat. He was still breathing. But his dark coat was saturated with blood. It dripped from the fabric and pooled on the ground, the stain expanding at an alarming rate. Veronica grabbed JD’s face in her hands. Her fingers, too, were covered in blood—both his and hers—and they left red streaks where she touched him.

         “JD! God help me, Jason Dean, you stay with me!” His head lolled weakly, his eyes drifting closed. “Shit,” she murmured. Gritting her teeth, she got back to her unsteady feet and grabbed JD’s boots, hauling him toward the back of the building. The hem of his trench coat dragged behind him, painting the grass with a wide stripe of red. The effort it took to move him was agonizing, but she couldn’t imagine the pain he felt, being yanked along the rough ground by his feet, a bullet lodged in his gut. Was he even still feeling pain?

         She shook her head, banishing the thought. He was fine. He would be fine. He had to be.

         Finally, they were at the back edge of the building, and JD let out a grunt as Veronica adjusted her grip and pulled him around the corner. It was a painful sound, but music to her ears. He was still breathing.

         With a final tug, she positioned them against the center of the back wall, and it was as if all her strength gave out at once. The adrenaline, the fear, whatever had been keeping her upright abruptly failed, and she collapsed to the ground with a gasp of relief and pain.

         Not half a second later came the explosion.

         The entire earth shook beneath her, the boom loud enough to make her vision go white. She felt the fiery breeze of the shockwave rush past the building—the shockwave that would have set off the other bombs.

         And then nothing.

         Her ears rang, she saw spots. She tasted blood and realized her nose had started bleeding. Her head felt like a balloon filled to bursting, and the acrid smoke in the air was enough to make her choke. But she was alive. She had done it. She had gotten them far enough away.

         It was then that her brain caught up, and she rolled over, pushing herself onto her elbows to crawl to JD. When she made it to his side, she threw herself on top of him, desperately feeling for some movement in his chest. It rose and fell shallowly under her hands. She nearly sobbed at that. Was it relief behind her tears? Anger? Frustration? No, she realized. She just didn’t want him to die. JD had done horrific things—terrible things. But he didn’t deserve to die for them. No one did.

         The tears did come, then. They rolled silently down her cheeks as she lay there half on top of him, helplessly pushing at his wound, trying to stem the bleeding. It had slowed significantly, but not because of any clotting or healing. He was simply running out of blood.

         In the distance, she became dimly aware of shouting as people poured out of the main school building. The sirens seemed to come impossibly fast—but no, those weren’t sirens. That was the fire alarm ringing out from the building above them. Not help. No one coming for him. For either of them. Only more noise and panic as JD lay dying beneath her.

         It was eighty-seven more of JD’s shuddering, shallow breaths before someone found them. Hands were on her, helping her stand and then supporting her when her ankle gave out once again. A paramedic.

         Her silent tears turned to open weeping, relief washing over her at the sight of the ambulance that had somehow pulled up without her noticing. The sirens must have gotten buried under the rest of the chaos. She watched as more paramedics descended, scooping up JD and placing him on a stretcher before whisking him into the ambulance.

         He’d made it. They both had. She’d gotten them to safety.

* * *

 

         It didn’t take much to pin the whole thing on JD’s dad. Not Heather, Ram, and Kurt of course. Those cases were already closed. But with a little manipulation of facts, Big Bud Dean took the fall for the attempted bombing and near-murder of his son. His fingerprints were all over the gun, he had a reputation with bombs and suspicious deaths, and his only alibi was the six pack of beer he’d been drinking at home in front of the TV. No one missed him. Veronica had gotten good at spinning lies these last few months, but this one was different. This would be her last.

         JD spent a few weeks in the hospital, and then several more in the psych ward. Veronica was glad to see him get help. She missed him, but she supposed who she really missed was the JD she had seen that first day—the Baudelaire-quoting, bully-beating nobody who had utterly stolen her heart. Not the psychopath that had broken it.

         Still, she stayed in contact with him while he was away. They wrote letters and exchanged phone calls, and one time Veronica even went to visit him, and they’d watched The Princess Bride on the common room TV together. With a significant distance of empty couch between them, but still. It had been nice.

         It was rocky. They were broken, both of them, both inside and out. But coming so close to blowing up and bleeding out…it had changed them. They were still broken, but the pieces weren’t nearly as sharp.

         JD was like a new person out from under his dad. The same humor, the same little edge of darkness to his words that kept Veronica on her toes, but now there was nothing to feed that anger, nowhere for it to fester, no one to drive it. That ever-present crease between his brows finally relaxed, the protective hunch of his shoulders eased. He looked so much happier. His life wasn’t a war for survival anymore.

         When Veronica had visited the second time, he had asked her to prom. Provided he was out of here by then, of course, but he was doing well. It gave him something to aim for, that date. So, she said yes. He’d shown up on her doorstep that night in a slightly-too-large, borrowed-from-god-knows-who, utterly-uncharacteristic royal blue suit, and a beaming smile.

         Things were different, of course, this time around. But it was a good different. A better different. JD got to know Martha and Betty, and before long all four of them were having movie nights and going bowling every weekend. He rejoined the A/V club and even managed to make some friends of his own. He had a talent for tinkering, it turned out. Taking things apart and putting them back together just a little bit better.

         Graduation loomed ever closer on the horizon, but it didn’t seem like such a desperate escape to Veronica now. It was just another day, another milestone that she was grateful to see; only one other person knew how close they had both come to never making it that far. And now they would get to share that day, together. And all the days after that, if that was what they chose. They had whole lives ahead of them, open wide and full of possibilities. The future spread out like a rainbow, flooding the horizon with light so bright it was nearly blinding.     

         It was scary. It was new.

         It was beautiful.


End file.
